Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1887-01-05
CHAPTER II.

~. i
in our boudoir story, has bten dismissed as
rapidly as was possible, Indeed, it would
never have been told OF al, had it not been a
link in the chain Of incident on which the his
utory depends
OF course, all Kettlewell applauded our
Sophia. Her midnight descent, her fight
across the hall, her plucky behavior at the
bell rope--everyt ything she had done was
praised Ths burglars fed at the first peal,
but Sophia kept on ringing until all the
neighbors were aroused; and then such a
congregation Of servants and others had
gathered in the house, and grounds that
fear was not to be Thought of. All Of us
applauded her quicknessof thought about the
belfry; theonly person Who spoke in anything
like q qualified tone being Egerton, who re-
marked that he was far;from wishing to cast
any slur on Sophia, hutstill he must say that
she would have made agTeat deal more noise
il she had used the Chinese gong which stood
in the hall For sounding an alarm, Egerton
said, there was nothing like Chinese gong.
Sophia, in the gentlest way, but with laugh
ter trembling on hers lips, pointed out that
the gong stood jpst There the robbers were
working; upon which Egerton retorted that
he had not said anything about where it
stood, but only that for sounding an alarm
there was nothing Lille Chinese gong.
Now, how would you expect the little
mother to have actell To have denied her
own abject terror, and attenuated Sophia's
bravery She did nothing of the kind.
II was dead with fear" she said, in her
cav way. Courage IS not one Of my vir-
tues. Icould no more have gone down those
stairs and rast those dreadful men than
could raise that piano with my finger. Deuce
take my HEARTH metimes, in her easy
moods, she would LET fly an expression Of this
sort-aI thought it would never beat again!
And Sophia was as cool as if she were going
down to see visitor Sophia ought to be a
soldiers wife; she ought to be soldier her
self. Few women would have acted as she
did that night Really, would not have be-
lieved she had it in her,"
( One happy result for the poor girl was that
her mothers wrath was not so much ap-
peased as effaced The whole Prendergast
incident l1as for the time forgotten; and
wheY Mrs Barbara Temples mind rgveTrEd
totli matter, she admitted to herself that in
char Sophia WITH weakness she made a
greai) )alistake. She still deplored the issue
of the affair, but she never again reproaohed
her daughter, and she even made one or two
indirect apologies for her severity OF speech,
and these we may be sure Sophia was only
too willing to accept.
And now there began quite an era in
sophia's life. Her lover was absent, and
they were not allowed to communicate with
eachaather, for on this point Mrs. Temple
never relaxed. She was not formally en-
saged; indeed, she was understood to be open
to an offeTEa fact which her mother, still
following her original policy, took careato
publish abroad. Caroline and Sibyl now
fully agreed with their mother that Sophia
was acting recklessly in allowing the fresh
ness Of her youth to pass away under this
blghting spell. And all this time, only by
the merest chance, seldom-perhaps never
could she hear anything of Percival Brent He
might be untrue; and even then, according to
thewords of their agreement, she could not
reproach him with incontsancy It was a
trying time for her; tut during this period
her character was. formed, and she who on
her fiftieth birthday was with general con-
sent and delight styled "Lady Beauty" learned
her secret Of charming in this period Of
anxiety and waiting, when her constancy
and her patience were so severely tried I
here relate the main incidents Of this unevent-
full period, and having at the same time tried
by touches here and there to give you an
idea of the maturity Of charms toward which
Time was bearing our dear heroine. shall
be able in my next book to tell you how it all
ended; whether Percival was true or false;
whether or not happiness of the kind she ex-
pected rewarded the constancy of her pure,
glowing, and yet never impatient affection.